Performance poet John Cooper Clarke talks about the challenge of writing and performing in working men's clubs.
John Cooper Clarke chats about his background in the nightclub scene and his association with punk, a movement which he found to be a very literary. He cites the New York punk scene and French symbolist poetry of the late 19th century, and the work of Patti Smith and Tom Verlaine as influences on his work.
Writing does not come easily,
I'd do anything rather than write a poem
he says referring to
The horror of the blank white space
John Cooper Clarke takes to the studio floor and provides the audience with a taste of his new, previously unperformed work titled 'Back at the Scandal School'.
This episode of 'TV GAGA' was broadcast on 9 January 1986. The presenter is Liam Mackey.
